Finally Got It

So If I don't post for a couple days, you know EXACTLY where I am.

Keep it Sexy, America

Well, I Should Be Finishing the Fight Right Now

... But I am not.

Thanks Amazon. Normally video game pre-orders go out a couple days before the actually street date, and you usually get them on Launch Day. With HALO 3... Not so much. My order didn't go out until late last night. According to NeoGaf that is par for the course for Amazon's HALO 3 pre-orders. And a couple of pre-orders with overnight shipping haven't even shipped yet.

Oh, and the best is that UPS actually made it from Sparks, Nevada to Los Angeles, California by this morning. Well, close to Los Angeles. Last tracking info says Vernon, California, which is less than twenty minutes away. I mean, I could literally drive there from here. But according to UPS' Tracking Site my copy of HALO 3 has been "in transit" from Vernon to Los Angeles since 10:15 in the A.M. Way to go UPS! The only delivery company that must require its drivers to go two miles an hour on the freeway.

Yes, I am bitter and frustrated. Hopefully, tomorrow. There is Always Tomorrow.

Keep it Sexy, America.

Today is The Day of Days

This Is Weak Sauce

You know at some point corporations -- and by extension your Boss, your Manager, your Supervisor, your Whatever -- are just going to own you body and soul. There will be no separation between what you do between the hours of 9AM and 5PM to make a living, and what you do after 5PM to have a life.

The Daddy Corporation will dictate everything eventually. They will dictate what you do and where you go because a good corporate drone does not go to bars on Weeknights and would never get completely blitzed in public. For shame, for shame. To keep health insurance costs at the bare minimum the Daddy Corporation will dictate what you eat -- put the Mickey D's down for god sake, you know you are going to have a heart attack at 50 if you eat that and run up your healthcare costs. Eventually the Big Daddy Corporation of the future will even dictate what you think and when you think it; I imagine a complicated series of electrodes and wire cable running from your snoozing head late night back to some black, windowless oblisque built in the center of Nowhereville Desert Town U.S.A -- have a dirty dream about that girl in in I.T. or dream about shoving a shotgun in your Boss' mouth, ZAP! Instant electric thought correction. Now go back to sleep, dear. You got to wake up at five in the morning afterall to start that morning commute.

Its already started. Little bits of freedom we've already consensually signed away, yielding to the immovable forces that command us to seek out Make-Work for our Make-Lives in huge, souless office towers. Like most bullshit that I have come to vie as just... well, just the way Life Is, I have no idea where it started. Probably with the random drug tests, meant to ferret out those dangerous dopers lurking in the corridors of Corporate America.

Now it is so bad that a person cannot even write or speak for fear of getting fired. Take the case of Jennifer Zenner who was (keyword there) a contractor for Nintendo who recently got fired for blogging. According to Kotaku by way of The Stranger Jennifer Zenner got canned at Nintendo for penning this blog under the pseudonym Jennifer Carr. Now she never wrote about Nintendo directly, or her bosses specifically. Although I guess one of her bosses figured it out from gems like this:

"One post on Zenner's blog—titled "The Daily Weed"—begins with her disputing her friends' perception that she is a pothead. She digresses into a wry tirade against one of her bosses: "One plus about working with [a] hormonal, facial-hair-growing, frumpy [woman] is that I have found a new excuse to drink heavily," Zenner writes. "My gut tells me that this woman hasn't been fucked in years."

(Paging Perrin Kaplan, paging Perrin Kaplan...)

Yeah, it is raw. Brilliantly raw, and many of us would say the same or worse about people we have to work around. Jennifer just happened to stick it up on a blog instead of blurt it out sotto voce around the water cooler. More importantly, she was blogging on her time and her dime, seeing fit to utilize what her own time they way she wanted. And, because Nintendo did not like what she was doing in her free time, Jennifer gets fired.

There is no longer a line between work and private life. We like to pretend there is but that is playing dress up with moral concepts. The truth is that whenever you or me choose to work for the machine of Corporate America we sign our rights away for a paycheck and an uncertain future.

The most ironic part of the story is that Jennifer Zenner's husband is stationed in Iraq right now supposedly fighting for concepts like "Freedom of Speech" and "Democracy" for Iraqis when his wife is being denied those very same rights back here in these United States.


Keep it Sexy, America

Just Got Back

... from San Diego. I'll have more later; nothing all that special happened except a late night journey into the dark heart of Mexico known as Tijuana (more on that later). I will say that returning to Los Angeles is a bit of a re-adjustment afte three days at the beach in probably one of the most beautiful cities in the world.

I mean, compared to San Diego, Los Angeles is, well, kinda a shithole.

Keep it Sexy, America

Paucity of Posts

Endless cycle of nothing to and therefore nothing to blog about. That's the cycle I am caught in right now. I am going to San Diego this weekend so hopefully that will yield something of interest. Or not.

Keep it Sexy, America.

On Canadian Tax Credits

I just posted this to LAProducers regarding a rather bone-headed petition to force Canada to drop its tax credits for film and television productions.

I am sure it will go over well in a group of RA-RA America First, Neo-Republicans. Yeah, believe it or not there are Republicans in Hollywood. Quite a few. I'd say the majority when it comes to people who work behind the camera. Or at least Fifty / Fifty. See one thing "Hollywood People" have in common with the rest of your schlubs in Fly-Over country is that they really, really, really like money and want to keep as much as it as they can. Even if that means voting for a political party whose main support derives from Bible Thumping Nazis that would love to see Ninety Nine Percent of Hollywood lead way in chains.

Don't ask; never made much sense to me either.

And the one thing Hollywood Republicans despise more than paying Taxes or the French re the dreaded Canadians. Yup, those dastardly Canucks that TAKE OUR JOBZZZZZ up North. Of course this irrational hate is completely misplaced. Instead of say lobbying our own government to support the arts through tax credits as much as Canada does the Hollywood Republicans want to Canada to get rid of the tax credit system that attracts most Hollywood production in the first place.

Which prompted this response.

To LAProducers:

Just my 2 cents because I've worked around and for Canadian productions and American productions, Canada and their tax incentives are not the enemy. The enemy is largely ourselves when it comes to runaway production.

We don't need to end another country's tax incentives (and, by the way, haven't the last seven years taught us anything about meddling in another country's affairs -- guess not), we need to pressure our own governments -- both local and federal -- into setting up tax incentives of our own that can be competitive with Canadian tax credits.

Is it "corporate welfare"? Sure, to a degree. But the film industry -- particularly the independent film industry -- is driven by investment of capital by people. Generally speaking people just don't toss money at anything out of the goodness of human kindness; they do it because there is an incentive to do it. Sure that government underwritten incentive may allow Person X to defer a tax burden, but that incentive also gives a lot of us jobs...Jobs which in turn allow us to pay taxes...A lot more taxes then your average millionaire pays. (See, millionaires and million dollar corporations find ways to hide their money regardless of the film industry or not, regardless of a government sanctioned way to do it or not.)

Also the Canadian government values the business of filmmaking as a key driver of the economy and therefore they support it. The "Arts" are tender things and, unlike most business, often do need to be supported an nurtured by both the government and private interests. This has been true since... at least Michelangelo and probably all the way back to the stone age. Canada seems to largely "Get It" -- get that the small investment the government -- and by extension society -- makes in the Arts by tax credits gets returned to them twenty fold in terms of both economic and cultural growth.

Our government on the other hand sees the film industry as ... well, at best, an effigy to be hung out for public ridicule every four years as the source of every social ill imaginable. When the film industry isn't being blamed for the latest school shooting we are largely ignored as a curiosity.

That is what needs to change.

We need to import what Canada and other Western Countries are doing to support the film industry. What we don't need to do is collectively thump our chests like impotent Imperialist Gorillas and demand that other countries suffer so that Americans get wealthier.

My 2 cents and, yeah, I'm in the minority.

Keep it Sexy, America.

Blogger Upload Test

Teste, teste...

Keep It Sexy, America

When Game Marketing Goes Wrong

(I promise I will stop posting HALO 3 tidbits...Honestly. Maybe Not.)

Keep it Sexy, America.

Blogger's Being a BATCH

Some reason Blogger's FTP publisher is running like a grandmother on quaaludes. So you may read all the stuff I've written over the weekend a week from now.

Keep it Sexy, America

The New TV Season is Upon Us

Sunday night is Emmy night.

Well, not for me; for me Sunday Night is Football Night. Wow, did I just parrot an NBC marketing campaign? Guess I did. Flows so well though. Anyway, I am not passing up the Chargers and the Patriots to watch The Sopranos get dissed again by My Vagina Also Weeps -- er, I mean, Grey's Anatomy.

After Emmy Night we can soon expect a new glut of network television for the masses to gorge themselves on and for me to mostly ignore. I can honestly say that there isn't a new show out there that really appeals to me. Well, maybe "Bionic Woman", and the only reason I have any hopes for "Bionic Woman" is the job David Eick has done bringing the Battlestar Galactica franchise back to relevance.

Everything else just strikes me as vaguely BLAH. Jimmy Smits is supposed to get me excited? I don't even know what "Cane" is about. Sugar? Cocaine? Procaine? Walking Canes?

As far as returning shows. With 'LOST' out of commission until January my only appointment network TV is "HEROES" and "Friday Night Lights" -- which I know is going to get cancelled two shows into the new season and no, I'm not going to beg anyone to watch it or buy the first season on DVD because the public in general seems to have an aversion to good TV -- this Fall.

Deep breath.

Oh, wait, I forgot "The Office" and "30 Rock".

The CSI Franchise abandoned any strain of credibility long ago and just took a left turn into absurd. Law and Order: Fred THompson for President bores me to tears, Law and Order: Butt Sex Unit has the depth of a Sunday School Pamphlet, and Law and Order: Vincent D'Onofrio is Nuts... is that still on? Eh, who cares...

Much like the Summer movies this year, network TV has done nothing to inspire any sort of devotion this year. God knows, I might have to do something productive with my weeknights.

Keep it Sexy, America

HALO 3: Making of Belief

Keep it Sexy, America

Halo 3: Believe

I admit it. I am a HALO 3 nut and on September 25th when the UPS Dude drops it off on my doorstoop I am going to put all the other bullshit in my life aside for a couple of days.

Unit then... Believe...









Keep it Sexy, America

Only 11 Days to Halo 3

Current Unrealistic Daydream No. 1908

I really want to travel to Europe on an Ocean Freighter and run around France, and Denmark, and the United Kingdom for a couple months. America bores and disgusts me nowadays.

Sorry to say it but Mike Gravel is right when he says Americans are getting getting dumber and fatter. I want to live in a part of the world not in a state of perpetual fear and war, not constantly consumed with flipping houses or buying more crap no one really needs; somewhere where there is at least the pretense of a free and open society not hog-tied by the Church and 19th Century morality.

But, as a sigh escapes my lips, I know me running off to Europe for a year is as currently unrealistic as me finding affordable Loft space in Downtown Los Angeles.

Nice daydream though.

Keep it Sexy, America

Most Fun I've Had All Week

My friend Gabe...





(Yes, that's Him.)

... Has been crashed out with me for the last couple of days from San Diego.

Since his arrival he's been playing Marathon sessions of "OBLIVION" on Xbox 360. I got to say watching him play "OBLIVION" is probably the most fun I've gotten out of "OBLIVION" all year.

Keep it Sexy, America

Looking for A New Apartment

I remembered now why I procrastinated so long and avoided the proccess of finding a new apartment until it became excessively necessary. Its a giant pain in the ass, and downright creepy too.

There is the normal crap like outrageously out of whack prices, "paying" a twenty or thirty dollar vig so some greaseball apartment manager can check your credit, and those guys on Craig's List looking for "female roommates" that reek of drooling and spanking. I am also noticing something new: The Desperate Urbanite.

Young-ish couples who obviously got into mortgages they had no business getting for houses they had living in, and now they are trying to desperately keep their failing ship a-float by renting out "spacious" rooms in "kickass houses" for upwards of $1,000 a month with a $1,000 deposit (you will never see again). You can smell the desperation all over them, practically hear the footsteps of the Sheriff's heels coming up the walk, and see the past due letters piling up on the stoop. And your the doe-eyed tenant that will bail out their slice of the American Dream sinking into the sub prime sea.

Now the possiblity of shoving all my worldly possessions in storage for a couple of months and walking the Earth does not seem so bad next to the alternative. I say that now but wait until I start missing the second season "HEROES" consistently.

Keep it Sexy, America.

P.S. No, I am not downloading episodes of "HEROES on Amazon Un-Box. C'mon NBC, give us iTunes downloads and the Cheerleader doesn't get hurt.

To Rent and Die in L.A. Part 2

So somewhere between Evansville and Tulsa, caught in a four mile jam up caused when a big rig and a pick-up sprawled across two lanes, I realized something. I didn't give a shit about my apartment anymore.

The things that made it feel like home where gone, or violated by the bouregious land overlords that own my building to such a degree that my apartment no long felt like a saf, quiet refugee. No matter what I did or how many complaints I filed with the proper bureacracy my home would never feel like my place ever again. I would just be living in fear of the next knock at the door, the next made up complaint, the next attempt to toss me onto the street.

Orly (Maciborski -- the building owner) was leaving me messages telling me she was going to hold, or send back my rent check because "we had to have discussion" in a Natasha Accent from "Bullwinkle". Orly didn't even seem to remember all those easily thrown out accusations; she just wanted me to give notice or -- strongly implied -- they would keep coming up with bullshit every month until I did leave. I would never have peace at a place that had ceased to feel like home. So, to her shock, I said I would give Sixty days notice. I was done; over.

The thing was is that this had nothing to do with the roaches, or the neighbors, or the cats. This had everything to do with the fact that Eric, my buiding's manager, had promised one of his Surfer Doodz friends my apartment seemingly months ago and at a higher rent than I paid. He seemed vaguely irritated when I handed in my notice. When I inquired why he whined that he told his friend he could move in in October, now what was he going to do?

Indeed. Now what was he going to do?

Hell, what was I going to do I wondered? Despite not having the slightest clue, or inkling I knew I would figure it out. I had lingered too long anyway. I had grown stagnant and complacent in my station in life. I had gotten too comfortable with my own mediocrity.

Time for a change.

When I got back to the place that was no longer home around ten on Thursday night everything was quiet and empty. Dead space. The building's maintenance mexicans had torn my posters and art from the walls, yanked my chest and drawers away from the walls, and tossed open my cabinets filled with un-covered dishes like cheap Mafia thugs looking for hidden loot. Everything reaked of bug foggers and their dead soldiers littering my shit-brown carpet.

This was not where it was at anymore.

Keep it Sexy, America.

Things I Learned From Watching Basic Cable in Indiana

ESPN's Dana Jacobson is Hot.

(Old picture though. Dana, if you read this hit your homeboy up with a decent photo you sexy thang)

Keep it Sexy America

Well, I am Back

Made it back to Hollywood last night through a couple of rain storms and angry calls back and forth with my landlord. Thank the gods for friends ... that get you drunk.